Bookcover Spotlight #56

This is a classic Peanuts compilation- I had this as a kid and I think I still have it somewhere (I think the dust cover is long gone) but these are so fun- you can just get them out and read them anytime, and they're a window on another world. No adults just the timeless exploits of some kids in a neighborhood.

Bonus- I thought I'd include a cover gallery of some of the Peanuts Parade books. These are kinda fun and I had one of these as well... but most of these I haven't seen.

The Invisible Library

Imagine a library existing outside of space or time, where a group of dedicated librarians travel to alternate worlds to recover rare texts. Some of these worlds are contaminated with chaos magic, however, and are populated by vampires, werewolves, fae creatures and the like. This is the premise of The Invisible Library. The library itself is a mysterious place- it's huge for one thing, taking librarians sometimes days to traverse its halls. We're not told how big it is, and this is just one of the mysteries that will hopefully be explored in future books.

I thought this was a good book with lots of interesting ideas. The idea of a conflict between Law and Chaos is not a new one but it's nice to see it reappear in fantasy, especially in a YA. One of my favorite tropes. And I also like the idea that underneath the surface the library may serve its own purposes and its servants are unaware of this. That is certainly hinted at here as Irene, a junior Librarian, has to go a Victorian era world with elements of chaos and clockwork tech, to find a book that turns out to be very important indeed.

Along the way Irene will be tested and forced to look at her role in a new light, and to consider the ethics of what she does. What gives her the right to enter a world and take a book that may affect the lives of many? I liked the character growth here in Irene as she starts to re-examine some of her assumptions, and there are a lot of intertwined plot strands that made this a fulfilling read. I especially enjoyed Bradamant, a rival with superior rank who shows up to make her life miserable- her inclusion and the intrigue associated with it made the plot more fun.

 The book starts off with Irene on a mission, so we jump right into the action. Even so it took me a while to get into this story- I actually spent a few days away from it and wasn't sure I was going to like it- but I stuck with it and as soon as Irene got to her world and her mission began I was hooked. There are some neat concepts here, and the idea that Librarians are basically immortal- they don't age when they're in the Library- is just one of them. I'm looking forward to the next book to see what more we can learn and what Irene gets herself into next- judging from this it should be a wild ride.

A Dance with Dragons The Griffin Reborn

This week two very interesting chapters- we have Jon Connington returning to Westeros after many years and we get a peek at the Stormlands. Then we revisit Asha who is a prisoner of Stannis and on the way to Winterfell with him- but the snow and horrible weather are wreaking havoc on Stannis' army. So we get insights into very different but similar military commanders, one from the man himself and another from a Greyjoy perspective.

THE GRIFFIN REBORN

Jon Connington is back in Westeros and retakes the castle Griffin's Roost, his ancestral home. He uses his famed archers to shoot down the ravens they try to send out and we see that he can have a ruthless side.

As they neared the castle, he saw a third raven flap from the maester's tower, only to be feathered by Black Balaq himself. "Mo more messages," he told Ser Franklyn Flowers in the yard. The next thing to come flying from the maester's tower was the maester. The way his arms were flapping, he might have been mistaken for another bird. 

Jon goes to the highest tower and looks over his reclaimed lands, and recalls doing so with Rhaegar  when they were younger. We learn here that Jon apparently was in love with Rhaegar and he thinks about how he lost it all when he tried to defeat Robert during the rebellion. He had Robert trapped  and was searching the town but the townsfolk were hiding Robert. Then Ned Stark and Hoster Tully arrived with an army and battle was joined, and Robert emerged and almost killed Jon. He has been Hand of the King, young and ambitious, but he was exiled after that by Rhaegar's father.

Jon reflects that he didn't want the blood of the town on his hands, after Myles Blackheart Toyne told him that Tywin Lannister would have burned the town to the ground to get Robert. Jon thinks that he failed since Robert lived and went on to kill Rhaegar. "I failed the father," he said, "but I will not fail the son."

The discipline of the Golden Company allows them to move swiftly, and they expect Ser Tristan Rivers to take Crow's Nest (house Morrigen) and LAswell Peake to take Rain House (house Wylde) quickly. Their elephants have not turned up yet as their fleet was scattered in storms. Halfmaester tells him that Dorne has two armies on standby and Jon sends a message to Dorne asking for support. They find out that Marq Mandrake has gone ashore at Estermont and had taken Greenstone.

When Aegon arrives he has three of the elephants and Lady Lemore is with him as well.

MY THOUGHTS: 

Lots of info- this is one of my favorite chapters. Again I am wondering who Lady Lemore really is.

THE SACRIFICE

Stannis is going to sacrifice some men who resorted to cannibalism as the army is bogged down in the snow and there is little to eat. This is from Asha's perspective. It's one hundred leagues (three hundred miles) from Winterfell to Deepwood Motte and they are stuck, although Asha thinks the northmen are having an easier time than the southrons.

They are surprised when riders come out of the snow - Tris Botley is with them, and Tycho Nestoris the banker from Braavos with a message from Jon- and Theon and Jeyne.

MY THOUGHTS: 

A tough chapter with burnings and the suffering of Stannis' men. Can Stannis's host survive and face the battle for Winterfell? And Tycho shows up to tell Stannis of the Karstark treachery.

The Winds of Winter- What's Next At The Wall?

As most fans of the books or show know, Jon Snow doesn't make it out alive at the end of A Dance With Dragons, the fifth book in the series. He is killed (or at least it appears that he is) by his own brothers in the Night's Watch after they consider him a traitor. Not all of his men feel this way, of course- but throughout the book Jon sends his closest supporters to other places and makes decisions that antagonize many of the Watch. Melisandre the red priestess even warns him several times to watch his back, that he has enemies, but he doesn't heed her. So at the end of the book it happens- and while we know on the show how it turns out, we don't know what's going to happen next in the books.

Spoilers for the books.

A lot is going on when Jon is stabbed repeatedly at the end of A Dance with Dragons. He has just received the so- called Pink Letter from Ramsay Bolton and has declared his intention to break his vow and ride south to confront Ramsay. The wildlings have enthusiastically supported him and this seems to be the last straw for many in the Watch. Jon has let the wildlings pass through the Wall in exchange for committing to fight with the Watch when the Others come. It's a simple matter of needing more men, and taking the wildlings because they have no other source of manpower- and also to save the wildlings- but Bowen Marsh and the other malcontents don't see that. They think the wildlings are the enemy, and Jon doesn't do a good job of communicating his rationale.

The interesting thing here is Castle Black is full of wildlings at the moment and also of southern men, the knights and soldiers loyal to Queen Selyse. She was left at Castle Black when Stannis went south, and indeed the Pink Letter asserts that Stannis has been defeated and that Ramsay wants the queen turned over to him, along with Shireen and Melisandre. Not only that but just before Jon is attacked all chaos breaks loose when one of Selyse's knights tries to get to Val, the wildling princess being guarded by the giant Wun Wun, and is basically torn apart by the giant. So everyone is drawing weapons and the place is a tinderbox.

Amidst all this Jon is stabbed repeatedly and presumably killed. What will happen next? Well there could be total chaos, a three way scrum between the Night's watch, the wildlings and the queen's men. The situation is more complex and volatile than depicted in the show. The wildlings have just agreed to follow Jon and he and Tormund are sort of BFF's at the moment, so they may not take kindly to Jon being stabbed out. The queen's men (and the queen) don't seem to like Jon -but Melisandre is the true power behind Selyse. If she commands the men to protect Jon or orders Selyse to do so, I don't see Selyse defying that.

And you have Wun Wun who just went apeshit and ripped a guy apart. There's a real chance that the giant goes on a rampage. But the real wild card for me here is... Melisandre, without a doubt. Selyse defers to her, probably fears her, and I think Melisandre will not be pleased to see Jon killed. There could be a bloodbath at Castle Black.

And we're not even touching on how Jon will come back (the assumption being that he will). This has all been settled on the show but the books will almost certainly take a different path. It seems that by killing him the Night's Watch has probably released him from his vows, enabling him to go south. But Jon is the only one thinking ahead to the true threat- the Others. Will he take Winterfell enabling the defenders to have a base to stop the northern apocalypse? Or will he come back to lead the Watch, if it even still exists? And there's a very good chance the Wall is coming down as well, and soon. Winterfell will be the crux of the fight if that happens.

Cover Characteristics Feathers

Cover Characteristics is a meme by Sugar and Snark- every week a characteristic is selected and we post 5 books with that week's theme.  

This week's pick- Feathers 

Feathers- another theme that can go several ways. Do you look for feathers alone, for birds or whatever feathered animals are out there, or ? I decided to go with some of both- I have feathers and I have feathered creatures. :) I thought all of these picks actually are pretty good covers- they all have something to offer, so let's take a look. 



This was my first favorite.

    

 This one's kinda I don't know different I guess but from what I can tell it maybe fits the book?  

  

This one actually is not really a favorite of mine, although I do like masques generally. I'm assuming there's a deception tone to this book although I don't know. 

  

I think all the Falling Kingdoms covers are nice.   

 

This is my favorite I think- it's got a nice clean art style, there's a bird in the background and the cloaked figure- it just all works.  

  

Obviously these are very popular and I'm not sure I even know what they're about- but they have nice covers.  

  

Ditto for this one- I think this is the final book of the series and I like the birds interspersed w/ the antlers. Nice cover.  




My last pick for the week- I like the bright nature of this one, it seems hopeful. 

Sunday Post #149

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted by Kimba the Caffeinated Book Reviewer

Another hot week although it cooled off a bit. Every day was nice though, blue sky- love this weather.  I did some reading this week but not a lot. I took a few days off and then jumped back into my current read. Now I just need to pick out what I'm going to read next. Oh well reader problems. 

I reviewed Summer Days and Summer Nights this week and had a discussion of the Gods of a Game of Thrones. It's not too late to weigh in with your thoughts. My TV binging continued with my thoughts on 12 Monkeys (still excellent) and the return of Zoo- is anyone watching that?  

The Olympics are coming! Hard to believe it's that time but I'm looking forward to it, I always enjoy watching the Games. Brazil is a beautiful country but some of the reports about water cleanliness are a little alarming, but hopefully Rio can pull it off and have a great Games. 

This week is the 4th of July here in the US, the fireworks are already going off all over here. Looks like a beautiful weekend for it. 


And I'm listening to...




PULP COVER OF THE WEEK: 

  
  
NEW ARRIVAL/ UPCOMING REVIEWS:



BOOKISH LINKS

Quixotic Magpie talks about Belle Isle in Detroit  in the summertime. 

Drizzle and Hurricane Books has a neat feature called Souvenirs From Around The World, where bloggers link up and share about their hometown/ country. 

Reading Every Night participated in Souvenirs From around The World and takes us to England.

Bookcover Spotlight #55